Philosophy Now Forum

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:53 am I am non-theistic and non-religious.

Re AI, what I meant we cannot expect AI or robots to deal with Morality and Ethics. The only involvement would be the human programmer responsibility to ensure the robots do not kill humans arbitrary.

I would argue that our artificial construct of A.I. is itself relative and there is no reason such life we "create" to BE another stage of Evolution with or without humans in the future to be there. I am certain that an A.I. can and will be made to feel conscious as well. And while it might not 'evolve' to have the same mechanism as biological evolution, their lives would be self-reflected as equally sentient and meaningful to them. Humans are not "special". I also don't have a belief that humanity as a whole is essential for individual prosperity. My own position is a logically nihilistic even if not pessimistic. The reality sucks that all of us are actually 'insane' to think we matter to the Universe.

You are begging this without justification. You keep imposing upon this argument that there exists a potential "secular objective absolute moral law(s)" without justifying how you know this apriori. You are definitely transferring your own sensation of 'good' will as though it is shared universally without recognizing that your own 'sense' of this is merely a function of the biological evolution and derived by those "windows of devolopment" factors I introduced to you. We'd need a digression to express how the simple can become complex. But I'd first need to determine your belief status regarding religion or this effort would be undermined at the get-go.

I have been providing justifications all along to support "secular objective absolute moral law(s)" do exists a priori [via survival and preservation of the species].
Note the "secular objective absolute moral law(s)" on 'no human shall kill another human' is derived from 'no sane human will want to be killed' which can be first verified by your own self and other human beings.

No, the "no humans should kill other humans" comes from the classical libereal ideal: to have as much personal freedom to do what we want so long as we do not impose harm on others." This is a POLITICAL 'guide' (goal) we just beg of each other as a means to optimize our prosperity.

[By the way, in case I forget, I see that on television today here in North America, a show called, "The Dr. Oz Show" has an episode called, "The Underground Group Fighting Sex Slavery in America". The group's leader is non-other-than Tony Robins, someone I find a fraud from his selling of how to succeed by proving how he succeeded by selling his very scheme on 'how to succeed'. There is a false flag conspiracy theory that there are "sex slaves" everywhere in America with super-villianous like conspirators kidknapping people in some crime syndicate that this group is intending to expose by playing some deceptive scheme themselves in order to expose.....a MEANS-to-ends type of thinking that I noticed you mention above and to which I'll be responding to later. This fear-mongering, which I believe is likely just another business scheme of Robins' and other right-wing extremist Evangelical-thinkers, promotes some of the threats themselves to which impose political influence but also think in terms of absolutes. So I may mention this later as I finish catching up on it as a write here.]

If it can be proven there are real Sex Slavery, then fighting it would be a good thing even though the above is not within my proposed Framework and System of Morality and Ethics.
If it is a false alarm, then it is fake news and should be condemned as such.

How?

Your newly created term, "Moral Function (in the brain)" is just the prior term, "conscience", as I just mentioned in my last post above. We may need a digression to see if I could possibly spell out your apparent support of a dualistic idea of mind and body that I think you hold. [And hopefully 'dispell' by my counterposition to that.]

[I had more here but lost it from being timed out again by a likely few minutes or even seconds. This is annoying and burdensome to have to rewrite what I put a lot of good effort into. I need a temporary break as my neck is too sore at the moment. I'll finish the last part of my response in one more post.]

I have referred to "Moral Function" many times, if not here, elsewhere in the forum.
It is related to the development of the "conscience" or "moral compass" or Moral Quotient of the person.
The 'Moral Function" is no different from other functions like, intelligence, sense, reason, emotions, etc. in the brain.
Do you have any idea how the Moral Function is represented by what neurons and related neurons in the brain and its potential can be increased in time via the right approach.

It is tiresome for you [and me to respond] because you are deflecting away from the main point of Morality and Ethics.

I really do not mean to be bursting your bubble because it is as much mine too that gets burst should I be depressing you or others for speaking. All I can say is that we CAN aim for the same intentional goals but have to do it through government and without conviction to any particular ideal by altering our system continuously from different parties in a continuous balancing act.

I think I've exhausted my means to communicate further on this with you on this topic for fear of defeating you when this is NOT my intent. You certainly seem to be a 'good' person from my perspective and I hope that you can have some affect by your well thought-out ideas and can prove me wrong. Good luck. I apologized here for my counterposition and am also sorry should it cause some discontent and hopelessness on your end as well as to all of humanity should I be the one who is 'right'.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 2:15 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:31 am

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 12:32 am I disagree on your belief that Ethics/Morality to be distinctly separate from Politics but understand that you believe that an absolute exists regardless of our potential to successfully determine this.

That Morality/Ethics is distinctly separate from Politics is like Science itself is separate from the Arts, Politics, Mathematics, Engineering, IT and other fields of Pure or Applied knowledge.
Engineering and IT use theories and knowledge from Science, but they are not Science per-se.
Political legislature do involve what is good and bad human behavior but Politics itself cannot be Morality & Ethics by definition.

Bad example. Technology from engineering is DEPENDENT upon Science. Morality is illusive and thus only 'art'(ificial) and ONLY relevant to human convention. That 'convention is "Politcs", the area of negotiating which morals get priority in practice.

You got it wrong.
The technology in Engineering is not from Science per se.
Yes, Technology in Engineering borrows from Science but it is only the scientific theories as confirmed via the Scientific Methods. There are also element of 'arts' skills and creativity in technology.
So Science is Science and Engineering is Engineering. Both are their own specific field of knowledge and not exactly the same.

It is the same for Morality and Politics which are distinctively different fields of knowledge and activities.
At present, morality seems to be synonymous with Politics which is enacting laws and enforcing human behavior toward 'good'. I believe you are very blind up on this.


As I had stated, Morality is focused on the individual's self development of good behavior while Politics is focused on the collective activities.
One of the critical element with Morality involves the competence for empathy and compassion which are driven from Mirror Neurons in the brain. Politics is not involved in empathy and compassion.
Hope you get this point.

How you presume we could VOLUNTEER ideal behavior IN PRINCIPLE is dependent upon the actual means of how people are treated in their environment. That is, those windows of development I mentioned extends the assigning of value by how WELL one is treated in the environment. "Good" outward expression towards others depends upon how WELL you are treated by OTHERS in the environment, not something from within in any relative absolute way let alone an absolute absolute way. And this comes about from ECONOMIC stability as one definite minimum prerequisite. You require either ALL people to have identical economy regardless of where you are or what you do. This is a Communistic ideal that presents problems of requiring setting a goal for everyone to expect a simple life without contrast from person to person. To many, this can only come about by force. And given Marx recognized this and why his proposed "Dictator" is required which goes against your hope of defeating 'slavery' since it would make us all have to think of life as just 'good' for just being alive without concern for other values.

You can't acheive this without destroying those who find themselves the most happiest for having the contrast of greater fortune and power over others. The reason you find the happiest people thinking shallowly and appreciative of "God" as their most credited justification is due to the fact that the environment FAVORS these people beyond the averages such that they would not permit being downgraded to some LESS happier state they are in to match the least successful in the environment.

I think you are deluded in your hope for some ideal that isn't even possible in principle. The alternative means to even hopefully make people on par with each other is to make everyone Kings and Queens....Gods...where no one requires the least suffering possible. Because this is impossible, AND you need some convention via some political governing system to set up. The only kinds of 'voluntary' non-governmental means to impose 'goodness' is universal by however you define it is RELIGION. And this is already proven to assure perpetual conflict.

Your claim of attempting any rationalized process to determine something 'relatively absolute' without politics and enforcement is a pipe dream. I keep arguing how your belief that there IS a real shareable morale is flawed yet you insist it is true apriori without the very science or logic you LACK before the fact. You need to derive the science and logic to prove first that there IS a shareable morality at all without concern to ones actual conditions.

I believe you are onto a straw-man where you keep claiming the ideals I proposed are to be enforced by some group of people.
I never claimed that but you keep insisting and pushing that down my throat with your usual Communism, Dictators, Marx and the likes.

I kept stating the ideals I proposed as secular objective absolute moral laws are not to be enforced at all. They are merely to be adopted by the individuals as GUIDES. Note GUIDE only. If they are merely guides, surely they are not to be enforced. You don't seem to get this point.

Note I have also repeated many times, the secular objective absolute moral laws are moral facts that are justified from empirical evidences and philosophical critical thinking. They can easily be tested by yourself and any other human beings.
Note it Science is not easy for a layman to test some of the more critical scientific theories, but you yourself can test the most critical secular objective absolute moral law, i.e.
"No human shall kill another human" absolutely, period!
This is inferred from;
'No sane human will volunteer freely to be killed by another human.'
You can use yourself as a test and experience to confirm the above.

As you can see from the above you are arguing with straw-man[s] from the wrong understanding of my points.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 2:37 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:31 am

Scott Mayers wrote: I understand the apparent disconnect. But I assure you that it is only an apparent one. Remember, I'm athiest. So I don't hold any belief that out complex state of existence means anything distinct from rocks or bacteria with respect to Nature. Only those who interpret Nature as being a subset of religious form of a god, could your own belief be rationalized.

I cannot build a whole logical argument in a simple response to your thread without a digression even more in required detail and depth than your own thesis left unsaid here. What I hear you saying is that you cannot seem to connect how something relatively featureless could derive the complexity of something as detailed as a moral rule. But this assumes the rule itself is not an artifact of the complexity of biology or chemistry in a similar philosophical concern about the dualism of mind and body with respect to consciousness. Note that the moral equivalent is "conscience" that is just an intentional separated spelling of "consciousness" etymologically. What you likely believe is that some form of 'dualism' exists that relates to the origin of the term, "conscience".

[I'll separate this response in another post for fear of losing everything I wrote so far.]

I don't understand your response to my point.
My point is we need a secular objective absolute moral law [of Good] as a guide to improve on human behavior towards good.
As such I have demonstrated how we can derive such a secular objective moral law as justified from empirical evidences and polished with philosophical critical thinking.
To implement this we need an efficient Framework and System of Morality and Ethics [FSME] - I have not gone into details on this.

Note sure of your point re Consciousness and Conscience.
However, my proposed efficient FSME will involving the development of the highest optimal 'conscience' for the individuals, i.e. the higher Moral Quotient where the person is spontaneously moral and good without the need for enforcement.

If we "need a secular objective absolute moral law [of Good] as a guide to improve on human behavior towards good.", you just gave the major justification for those arguing for religion to be NECESSARY as the means to assure this. They too also believe this cannot be done through formal govenments directly other than to use politics to empower their particular religions by proxy. They would thus argue like you for a presumption that there should be some scientific proof of this given it is certainly REAL of their relative absolute exists apriori.

You are wrong again.
Note the moral laws of theistic religions are not guides but commands from a God which is enforced with a threat of punishment to Hellfire on Judgment Day.
Surely you cannot be that ignorant on such an enforcement by God.

How can you be so wrong. Theistic religionists never rely on justified Scientific facts but critically on faith, i.e. beliefs without evidence, proof nor justified reasons. Yes, some Christians are referring to Scientific knowledge to prove God but those are unsound arguments.

I noticed that you keep mentioning that "no sane person would kill themselves" as well as some presumption about killing others. Why do you beg these as 'insane' other than to just dictate this is so? You would have to argue then that it is at least better that one suffers in slavery alive rather than be dead and free from the worst of the worst.

I believe those who volunteer freely to kill themselves would be certified by psychologists and psychiatry as some kind of mental illness.
Note my point include "volunteer freely to kill" without other conditions of a trade off like in terminal pains, and other extreme sufferings.

Look, I don't like busting your bubble and I would LOVE for you to be correct. But I've come full circle on my own original 'hope' that there were some non-religious way of creating a better world. The fact, given there is no actual gods to assure this, the only 'hope' we have is to optimize our circumstances and utilize political institutions to DEFINE morality. Morals are artificial, just as 'beauty' is to the beholder's eye. While we can create these ideals, like beauty, as from things we might base upon as from something 'healthy', this cannot succeed universally without eliminating those that are deemed 'ugly' in the same artificial way.

How could you burst my bubble with you are using strawman[s], misunderstood my points and are ignorant of the critical matters.

You are ignorant that, DNA wise ALL humans are embedded with an inherent Moral Function which is not very active at present but slowly unfolding as evident from human moral progress from past 100,000 years to the present.

Neuroscientists such as Marco Iacoboni (UCLA) have argued that mirror neuron systems in the human brain help us understand the actions and intentions of other people. In a study published in March 2005 Iacoboni and his colleagues reported that mirror neurons could discern whether another person who was picking up a cup of tea planned to drink from it or clear it from the table.[14]
In addition, Iacoboni has argued that mirror neurons are the neural basis of the human capacity for emotions such as empathy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_neuron

I suggest you update yourself on 'Mirror Neuron' and empathy/compassion.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 3:15 pm I think I've exhausted my means to communicate further on this with you on this topic for fear of defeating you when this is NOT my intent. You certainly seem to be a 'good' person from my perspective and I hope that you can have some affect by your well thought-out ideas and can prove me wrong. Good luck. I apologized here for my counterposition and am also sorry should it cause some discontent and hopelessness on your end as well as to all of humanity should I be the one who is 'right'.

You have thoughts of defeating, winning, losing, depressing, discontent, hopelessness, etc. in a philosophical discussion?
On this I believe you have gripped on the wrong end of 'Philosophy Proper'. If you are caught into such mental elements, you will suffer for it.

Whilst I am not a Buddhist, I adopt the core Buddhist principles as guides and one of the point is never to be attached or cling to winning or losing or any feelings.

The "currency" in any philosophical forum is to 'trade' logical and sound arguments between each other, that all one has to do. If one has alternative arguments to whatever is proposed then, throw it in. I would not expect any personal rewards or good or bad feelings from it.

Note the purpose of Philosophy from Russell with I adopt;

Thus, to sum up our discussion of the value of philosophy;

Philosophy is to be studied, not for the sake of any definite answers to its questions since no definite answers can, as a rule, be known to be true, but rather for the sake of the questions themselves;

because these questions enlarge our conception of what is possible, enrich our intellectual imagination and diminish the dogmatic assurance which closes the mind against speculation;
but above all because, through the greatness of the universe which philosophy contemplates, the mind also is rendered great, and becomes capable of that union with the universe which constitutes its highest good.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 3:00 pm I really do not mean to be bursting your bubble because it is as much mine too that gets burst should I be depressing you or others for speaking. All I can say is that we CAN aim for the same intentional goals but have to do it through government and without conviction to any particular ideal by altering our system continuously from different parties in a continuous balancing act.

As stated you will be torturing yourself with the above expectations, more so when you are ignorant of so many elements that are relevant and matter to the topic.

Re Morality, my take is a bottom-up approach unfolding from the inherent moral function [moral neuron circuits] of the individual as triggered by environmental forces.

Your approach to Morality is top-down i.e. expecting governments to enforce via politics on the individuals to change. In this case, you are exposing and opening the opportunity for rogue governments, e.g. Communism, fascism [which you condemned] to dominate. You cannot be certain whatever good you intended will manifest.

On the other hand, what I proposed leaves no room and possibility for any rogue government or politics to dominate the mind of the individuals.
In my case the individuals' mind are always guided [as an auto servomechanism] within an iterative model towards the ideal good leaving no room for any defect [evilness] to take hold.

I believe you are also dogmatically stuck with the present and its circumstances. Resistance to change is very natural with humans.
What I proposed cannot be immediately implemented overnight at present, but rather, it will be realizable in 50, 75 or >100 years. What we can do now is merely to start the initial discussion stage and take it from there progressively.

Oh. I just read everything just now and see that you seem to have more fire in you. I thought you were getting frustrated for me pressing on in argumentation with you given you appeared to agree at each stage though had to find another caveate of why you still believe contrarily. The topic to many is unwelcomed to BE 'defeated' given it has emotional impact when it appears to demonstrate something "nihilistic" about reality. So let me given it another round.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 4:14 am

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 2:15 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:31 am
That Morality/Ethics is distinctly separate from Politics is like Science itself is separate from the Arts, Politics, Mathematics, Engineering, IT and other fields of Pure or Applied knowledge.
Engineering and IT use theories and knowledge from Science, but they are not Science per-se.
Political legislature do involve what is good and bad human behavior but Politics itself cannot be Morality & Ethics by definition.

Bad example. Technology from engineering is DEPENDENT upon Science. Morality is illusive and thus only 'art'(ificial) and ONLY relevant to human convention. That 'convention is "Politcs", the area of negotiating which morals get priority in practice.

You got it wrong.
The technology in Engineering is not from Science per se.
Yes, Technology in Engineering borrows from Science but it is only the scientific theories as confirmed via the Scientific Methods. There are also element of 'arts' skills and creativity in technology.
So Science is Science and Engineering is Engineering. Both are their own specific field of knowledge and not exactly the same.

It is the same for Morality and Politics which are distinctively different fields of knowledge and activities.
At present, morality seems to be synonymous with Politics which is enacting laws and enforcing human behavior toward 'good'. I believe you are very blind up on this.


As I had stated, Morality is focused on the individual's self development of good behavior while Politics is focused on the collective activities.
One of the critical element with Morality involves the competence for empathy and compassion which are driven from Mirror Neurons in the brain. Politics is not involved in empathy and compassion.
Hope you get this point.

How could I 'get' your point when it is lacking foundation from my perspective? I don't know what is in your head but I'm not 'reflecting' your view. So much for 'mirror neurons' working well between our opinions.

Here you just adjusted your view to the individual's self reflection mirroring himself. Mirror neurons are proposed to refer to two different animals refecting like "monkey-see, monkey-do". This is no secret observation but because that activity is between two or more people, that becomes a SOCIAL activity, not a SOLO one.

Question: Do you believe that one's value of a sensation (pains/pleasure, feel/don't-feel) is assigned from the environment the way I expressed it regarding windows of development or do you think something intrinsic to nature has implanted some 'fit' essense of right and wrong exclusive to each proposed 'morale' you believe exists for the seeking?

You appear to be presuming the latter as though Nature is a one-sided creature that only knows 'goodness' and though we have some 'free choice' that we must automatically default as the correct one assigned as 'good' by Nature or we would be considered defective to Nature as being insane. If we don't have the choice in a determined way once your ideal exclusionary mechanism works, we'd all be in perfect sync with each other already regardless of what we do because of our physics would DEMAND superiority for 'good' or we'd revert to having the option to choose which values we define as 'good' in contrast to another person's 'evil'. How would this 'evil' being/set-of-behaviors even exist unless reality is ambiguous to the universal FAVOR of one set of behaviors over another?

To 'get' your point is to 'get' religious because it would imply some absolute-absolute to dictate which set of behaviors is certainly unanimously shared but free to deny relative to one's sanity. If you truly ARE then hypocritically asserting that we have 'relative'-absolutes about 'good and bad' things, what could that even mean in this context? You try to beg out exclusive behaviors that have those 'relative'-absolutes as though those beings that disagree with you MUST be insane for you just asserting it. Are you a more superior being to know that only insane beings are permitted to be flawed as being bad?

Here's your logic:

(1) It is immoral to do X.

(2a) All 'sane' people agree to X.
(2b) Only 'insane' people disagree to X (or believe that not-X is a good thing against the rest).

(3) If 80% of people select X, they are the 'good' people. The 20% left over are 'bad', not because they can help it but because they are 'insane'.

(4) If we find a way to segregate, isolate, and hopefully eliminate that 20% sanity in the population, then 100% of the people would be 'good' for the rest of eternity.

This last point would mean that you WEAN them out of the population or find some way get their heads 'fixed' and "educated" correctly until they conform or keep them locked up. If you still believe in some relativity to behavior but treat it as though it were genetic (such as psychosis of insanity implies) or changeable (...as in to possibly be able to make these insane people assimilate to FIT that 80% perspective or get them back behind their wall unable to hurt anyone), then your procedure, however you define it ,is "genocidal" in principle and ignorant of how this 'logic' you have just BEGS that you uniquely presume that you are not the insane one deluded about what is 'correct'. I mean, you must be thinking that you're 80% agreement to what is 'correct' behavior and must be true because it is DEMOCRATICALLY true should the whole population select/VOTE for the same correct behavior in some CONVENTION. [i.e. the side of the AUTHORITY that things like 'governments' represent.]

How is your view NOT 'political'? The word has the root 'pol(l)' and gives meaning to 'polite(ness)'. This behavior, if it is 'good' for being agreeable to 100% of the sane voters [because you just prevented the insane from being permitted to vote for them being 'insane']. How is your view NOT religious? You assure that those who disagree with the eventual proof of your prior 'guidence' to FIND what you are looking for. And if you can't find it yet, you still seem to KNOW that the goal post has a real fixed end in sight.

How you presume we could VOLUNTEER ideal behavior IN PRINCIPLE is dependent upon the actual means of how people are treated in their environment. That is, those windows of development I mentioned extends the assigning of value by how WELL one is treated in the environment. "Good" outward expression towards others depends upon how WELL you are treated by OTHERS in the environment, not something from within in any relative absolute way let alone an absolute absolute way. And this comes about from ECONOMIC stability as one definite minimum prerequisite. You require either ALL people to have identical economy regardless of where you are or what you do. This is a Communistic ideal that presents problems of requiring setting a goal for everyone to expect a simple life without contrast from person to person. To many, this can only come about by force. And given Marx recognized this and why his proposed "Dictator" is required which goes against your hope of defeating 'slavery' since it would make us all have to think of life as just 'good' for just being alive without concern for other values.

You can't acheive this without destroying those who find themselves the most happiest for having the contrast of greater fortune and power over others. The reason you find the happiest people thinking shallowly and appreciative of "God" as their most credited justification is due to the fact that the environment FAVORS these people beyond the averages such that they would not permit being downgraded to some LESS happier state they are in to match the least successful in the environment.

I think you are deluded in your hope for some ideal that isn't even possible in principle. The alternative means to even hopefully make people on par with each other is to make everyone Kings and Queens....Gods...where no one requires the least suffering possible. Because this is impossible, AND you need some convention via some political governing system to set up. The only kinds of 'voluntary' non-governmental means to impose 'goodness' is universal by however you define it is RELIGION. And this is already proven to assure perpetual conflict.

Your claim of attempting any rationalized process to determine something 'relatively absolute' without politics and enforcement is a pipe dream. I keep arguing how your belief that there IS a real shareable morale is flawed yet you insist it is true apriori without the very science or logic you LACK before the fact. You need to derive the science and logic to prove first that there IS a shareable morality at all without concern to ones actual conditions.

I believe you are onto a straw-man where you keep claiming the ideals I proposed are to be enforced by some group of people.
I never claimed that but you keep insisting and pushing that down my throat with your usual Communism, Dictators, Marx and the likes.

I kept stating the ideals I proposed as secular objective absolute moral laws are not to be enforced at all. They are merely to be adopted by the individuals as GUIDES. Note GUIDE only. If they are merely guides, surely they are not to be enforced. You don't seem to get this point.

Note I have also repeated many times, the secular objective absolute moral laws are moral facts that are justified from empirical evidences and philosophical critical thinking. They can easily be tested by yourself and any other human beings.
Note it Science is not easy for a layman to test some of the more critical scientific theories, but you yourself can test the most critical secular objective absolute moral law, i.e.
"No human shall kill another human" absolutely, period!
This is inferred from;
'No sane human will volunteer freely to be killed by another human.'
You can use yourself as a test and experience to confirm the above.

As you can see from the above you are arguing with straw-man[s] from the wrong understanding of my points.

No. you set up your own straw-man or forgot to ask the great Wizzard of Oz to give you a brain before you awoke this morning.

You asserted, "no sane human will volunteer freely to be killed by another human."

What do you think the military volunteer armies, called "Reserves" are doing? What do you think of those who jump out of planes to prove they trust their spouse when he or she asserts it is 'safe'?

Why does anybody take drugs voluntarily knowing the risks involved?

Are they just all insane? What about mercy killing/suicide? And if you think this is intolerably evil to you, what is your tolerance of permitting another to suffer more for your personal idea of 'virtue' to think it is only more sane to experience life 'enslaved to suffering' as you smile holding their hand going, "I love life. So you MUST too or you are just 'sick' in the head you delusional child. Quit you're crying...you're not dying. If you keep that up, I'm going to leave you and then you'll learn what sufferring really means all alone behind this wall with no one to speak to.

I think you need some more care in your logic. I am not maligning you by showing how your very thinking is linkable to those who THOUGHT they had a good ideal everyone intrinsically shared but proved only to become just the opposite when they lost the bet. The only means for an ethical behavior (a moral) to exist universally, is for one to impose it upon all people by some force, enslaving those who disobey, and/or give them an option to keep their feelings deep inside or risk be locked up or isolated from the rest of us.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:09 am
Here's your logic:

(1) It is immoral to do X.

(2a) All 'sane' people agree to X.
(2b) Only 'insane' people disagree to X (or believe that not-X is a good thing against the rest).

(3) If 80% of people select X, they are the 'good' people. The 20% left over are 'bad', not because they can help it but because they are 'insane'.

(4) If we find a way to segregate, isolate, and hopefully eliminate that 20% sanity in the population, then 100% of the people would be 'good' for the rest of eternity.

This last point would mean that you WEAN them out of the population or find some way get their heads 'fixed' and "educated" correctly until they conform or keep them locked up.
If you still believe in some relativity to behavior but treat it as though it were genetic (such as psychosis of insanity implies) or changeable (...as in to possibly be able to make these insane people assimilate to FIT that 80% perspective or get them back behind their wall unable to hurt anyone), then your procedure, however you define it ,is "genocidal" in principle and ignorant of how this 'logic' you have just BEGS that you uniquely presume that you are not the insane one deluded about what is 'correct'.

I mean, you must be thinking that you're 80% agreement to what is 'correct' behavior and must be true because it is DEMOCRATICALLY true should the whole population select/VOTE for the same correct behavior in some CONVENTION. [i.e. the side of the AUTHORITY that things like 'governments' represent.]

How is your view NOT 'political'? The word has the root 'pol(l)' and gives meaning to 'polite(ness)'. This behavior, if it is 'good' for being agreeable to 100% of the sane voters [because you just prevented the insane from being permitted to vote for them being 'insane']. How is your view NOT religious? You assure that those who disagree with the eventual proof of your prior 'guidence' to FIND what you are looking for. And if you can't find it yet, you still seem to KNOW that the goal post has a real fixed end in sight.

As typical, you are building another straw-man.
You created your own rhetorical argument and introduced your own inherent tendency to wean and commit genocide on your 20% of insane. I have no such ideas.

As far as I am concern, I will just stick to;

• (1) It is immoral to do X - as justified,
  (2) Thus it would be morally right to do Y - opposite of X.
  (3) The moral objective in 2 will be embedded as a GUIDE within the moral framework.

If there are really 20% of people who will be insane, that will not have an impact on 1-3 above. The moral objective will remain intact as justified.

Nope there is no need to wean off these 20% of the insane immediately. Those can be helped they will be assisted to normality. As for the hardcore insane, humanity will have to accept them as they are.

What can be done in this case [independent of my moral system] is for humanity to ensure future humans are born and prevented from being insane as much as possible with foolproof approaches.
As such, the aim would be to reduce the % of insane from 20% progressively to as low as possible in 20, 50, 75, > 100 years.

I believe you will continue to build more straw-man[s] later.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 5:08 am

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 3:00 pm I really do not mean to be bursting your bubble because it is as much mine too that gets burst should I be depressing you or others for speaking. All I can say is that we CAN aim for the same intentional goals but have to do it through government and without conviction to any particular ideal by altering our system continuously from different parties in a continuous balancing act.

As stated you will be torturing yourself with the above expectations, more so when you are ignorant of so many elements that are relevant and matter to the topic.

Re Morality, my take is a bottom-up approach unfolding from the inherent moral function [moral neuron circuits] of the individual as triggered by environmental forces.

Your approach to Morality is top-down i.e. expecting governments to enforce via politics on the individuals to change. In this case, you are exposing and opening the opportunity for rogue governments, e.g. Communism, fascism [which you condemned] to dominate. You cannot be certain whatever good you intended will manifest.

On the other hand, what I proposed leaves no room and possibility for any rogue government or politics to dominate the mind of the individuals.
In my case the individuals' mind are always guided [as an auto servomechanism] within an iterative model towards the ideal good leaving no room for any defect [evilness] to take hold.

I believe you are also dogmatically stuck with the present and its circumstances. Resistance to change is very natural with humans.
What I proposed cannot be immediately implemented overnight at present, but rather, it will be realizable in 50, 75 or >100 years. What we can do now is merely to start the initial discussion stage and take it from there progressively.

A 'bottom-up' approach begins with assuming NOTHING at all, both literally and figuratively. It is you who is thinking top-down given you assign something you think is true as a NECESSARY truth before you have scientific or logical proof of whatever you are calling "inherent moral funciton'.

I told you what it is on a chemical/biochemical level. Take some 'train' like chemical that might act as without moral concern as the underlying mechanism of some initial neutral and uncaring being. As it carelessly flies by, it might happen that some other chemical gets hooked and trapped in one of the cars of this train. While the passenger chemical could be 'bad', it might eat through the car and destroy the train. It then doesn't get to its destintation and both the train and the chemical doesn't get passed on to wherever else the train was heading without cause.

The alternative is that the chemical does nothing but sit on that car for its nature may be one that doesn't happen to eat cars. The train on its way to nowhere in particular, gets trapped in some place where other chemicals unload the 'cargo' which includes that free rider. This chemical that got a ride then gets welcomed as a guest for 'surviving' and this place's mayor grants him a name, call him "good".

That is all that begins the chain of abstract unthinking behavior that eventually becomes a whole being, like a human, who assigns value to whatever he gets attention for optimally. The less he cries in his life, the more likely he suffers less and gets to beat all those at the end who dies off assuring his VICTORY to assert he knows how great life is because he was 'good' enough to outlive all others.

This belief you have about intrinsic moral virtue is the same transference of Darwin's Theory of Evolution that references 'fitness' (as in a good match to its environment) into the different meaning, "fitness" (as in those that are healthy and good) [called 'Social Darwinism'] Note that it may be true that most women might prefer the nice and healthy 'fit' male who lifts weights at the gym each day after a long day as C.E.O. to his own business Empire and is in demand. But what tends to happen if the woman does this too? Is she admired for big muscles and her dominance to most men?

This is not to say this is not changing today. Rather, I'm pointing out how one is not 'considered' good EQUALLY among all members in society. To have the mere muscle on the side that wins does not make them 'superior' (nor 'inferior"). The accident of getting lucky enough to be born at all over other prenatal conceptions that die early on, makes the succeding one get to be the one that defines what 'good' it means to "be alive".

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:09 am

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 4:14 am I believe you are onto a straw-man where you keep claiming the ideals I proposed are to be enforced by some group of people.
I never claimed that but you keep insisting and pushing that down my throat with your usual Communism, Dictators, Marx and the likes.

I kept stating the ideals I proposed as secular objective absolute moral laws are not to be enforced at all. They are merely to be adopted by the individuals as GUIDES. Note GUIDE only. If they are merely guides, surely they are not to be enforced. You don't seem to get this point.

Note I have also repeated many times, the secular objective absolute moral laws are moral facts that are justified from empirical evidences and philosophical critical thinking. They can easily be tested by yourself and any other human beings.
Note it Science is not easy for a layman to test some of the more critical scientific theories, but you yourself can test the most critical secular objective absolute moral law, i.e.
"No human shall kill another human" absolutely, period!
This is inferred from;
'No sane human will volunteer freely to be killed by another human.'
You can use yourself as a test and experience to confirm the above.

As you can see from the above you are arguing with straw-man[s] from the wrong understanding of my points.

No. you set up your own straw-man or forgot to ask the great Wizzard of Oz to give you a brain before you awoke this morning.

You asserted, "no sane human will volunteer freely to be killed by another human."

What do you think the military volunteer armies, called "Reserves" are doing? What do you think of those who jump out of planes to prove they trust their spouse when he or she asserts it is 'safe'?

Why does anybody take drugs voluntarily knowing the risks involved?

Are they just all insane? What about mercy killing/suicide? And if you think this is intolerably evil to you, what is your tolerance of permitting another to suffer more for your personal idea of 'virtue' to think it is only more sane to experience life 'enslaved to suffering' as you smile holding their hand going, "I love life. So you MUST too or you are just 'sick' in the head you delusional child. Quit you're crying...you're not dying. If you keep that up, I'm going to leave you and then you'll learn what sufferring really means all alone behind this wall with no one to speak to.

I think you need some more care in your logic. I am not maligning you by showing how your very thinking is linkable to those who THOUGHT they had a good ideal everyone intrinsically shared but proved only to become just the opposite when they lost the bet. The only means for an ethical behavior (a moral) to exist universally, is for one to impose it upon all people by some force, enslaving those who disobey, and/or give them an option to keep their feelings deep inside or risk be locked up or isolated from the rest of us.

Note I stated "volunteer freely" without related circumstances, like war, etc.
Those who volunteered to be soldiers are always optimistic they will not die but win the war. If someone deliberate join a war just to die, that would be regarded as insane. Those suicide bombers who volunteer to die for whatever the reason -that is a mental problem.

Those who take drugs while aware of the risk of death also has the views they will not die. In any case, if they put themselves within the highest risk, they are not doing it voluntarily and freely but being addicted is already a pre-existing mental problem.

The point is, DNA wise ALL humans are "programmed" to survive at all costs until the inevitable.
Are there or have you heard of any normal or even any baby or infant who ever express they want to die the moment they can become self-conscious?
Thus any exception to the above with adults is a deviation from what is normal.

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:45 am A 'bottom-up' approach begins with assuming NOTHING at all, both literally and figuratively. It is you who is thinking top-down given you assign something you think is true as a NECESSARY truth before you have scientific or logical proof of whatever you are calling "inherent moral funciton'.

I told you what it is on a chemical/biochemical level. Take some 'train' like chemical that might act as without moral concern as the underlying mechanism of some initial neutral and uncaring being. As it carelessly flies by, it might happen that some other chemical gets hooked and trapped in one of the cars of this train. While the passenger chemical could be 'bad', it might eat through the car and destroy the train. It then doesn't get to its destintation and both the train and the chemical doesn't get passed on to wherever else the train was heading without cause.

The alternative is that the chemical does nothing but sit on that car for its nature may be one that doesn't happen to eat cars. The train on its way to nowhere in particular, gets trapped in some place where other chemicals unload the 'cargo' which includes that free rider. This chemical that got a ride then gets welcomed as a guest for 'surviving' and this place's mayor grants him a name, call him "good".

That is all that begins the chain of abstract unthinking behavior that eventually becomes a whole being, like a human, who assigns value to whatever he gets attention for optimally. The less he cries in his life, the more likely he suffers less and gets to beat all those at the end who dies off assuring his VICTORY to assert he knows how great life is because he was 'good' enough to outlive all others.

This belief you have about intrinsic moral virtue is the same transference of Darwin's Theory of Evolution that references 'fitness' (as in a good match to its environment) into the different meaning, "fitness" (as in those that are healthy and good) [called 'Social Darwinism'] Note that it may be true that most women might prefer the nice and healthy 'fit' male who lifts weights at the gym each day after a long day as C.E.O. to his own business Empire and is in demand. But what tends to happen if the woman does this too? Is she admired for big muscles and her dominance to most men?

This is not to say this is not changing today. Rather, I'm pointing out how one is not 'considered' good EQUALLY among all members in society. To have the mere muscle on the side that wins does not make them 'superior' (nor 'inferior"). The accident of getting lucky enough to be born at all over other prenatal conceptions that die early on, makes the succeding one get to be the one that defines what 'good' it means to "be alive".

I have explained what I meant by my bottom-up and your top-down as imposed politically from above. Again your are introducing a strawman -Darwin, gym, muscled men, women, blah blah blah .. to deviate from my point.

Note my previous post;
The point is, DNA wise ALL humans are "programmed" to survive at all costs until the inevitable and therefrom contribute to the preservation of the species.
Can you dispute this?
Whatever is to be a secular moral objective must be reduced and justified to the above.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:40 am

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:09 am
Here's your logic:

(1) It is immoral to do X.

(2a) All 'sane' people agree to X.
(2b) Only 'insane' people disagree to X (or believe that not-X is a good thing against the rest).

(3) If 80% of people select X, they are the 'good' people. The 20% left over are 'bad', not because they can help it but because they are 'insane'.

(4) If we find a way to segregate, isolate, and hopefully eliminate that 20% sanity in the population, then 100% of the people would be 'good' for the rest of eternity.

This last point would mean that you WEAN them out of the population or find some way get their heads 'fixed' and "educated" correctly until they conform or keep them locked up.
If you still believe in some relativity to behavior but treat it as though it were genetic (such as psychosis of insanity implies) or changeable (...as in to possibly be able to make these insane people assimilate to FIT that 80% perspective or get them back behind their wall unable to hurt anyone), then your procedure, however you define it ,is "genocidal" in principle and ignorant of how this 'logic' you have just BEGS that you uniquely presume that you are not the insane one deluded about what is 'correct'.

I mean, you must be thinking that you're 80% agreement to what is 'correct' behavior and must be true because it is DEMOCRATICALLY true should the whole population select/VOTE for the same correct behavior in some CONVENTION. [i.e. the side of the AUTHORITY that things like 'governments' represent.]

How is your view NOT 'political'? The word has the root 'pol(l)' and gives meaning to 'polite(ness)'. This behavior, if it is 'good' for being agreeable to 100% of the sane voters [because you just prevented the insane from being permitted to vote for them being 'insane']. How is your view NOT religious? You assure that those who disagree with the eventual proof of your prior 'guidence' to FIND what you are looking for. And if you can't find it yet, you still seem to KNOW that the goal post has a real fixed end in sight.

As typical, you are building another straw-man.
You created your own rhetorical argument and introduced your own inherent tendency to wean and commit genocide on your 20% of insane. I have no such ideas.

As far as I am concern, I will just stick to;

• (1) It is immoral to do X - as justified,
  (2) Thus it would be morally right to do Y - opposite of X.
  (3) The moral objective in 2 will be embedded as a GUIDE within the moral framework.

If there are really 20% of people who will be insane, that will not have an impact on 1-3 above. The moral objective will remain intact as justified.

Nope there is no need to wean off these 20% of the insane immediately. Those can be helped they will be assisted to normality. As for the hardcore insane, humanity will have to accept them as they are.

What can be done in this case [independent of my moral system] is for humanity to ensure future humans are born and prevented from being insane as much as possible with foolproof approaches.
As such, the aim would be to reduce the % of insane from 20% progressively to as low as possible in 20, 50, 75, > 100 years.

I believe you will continue to build more straw-man[s] later.

My rhetoric is only tangential to the logic here. It is appropriate to reflect how you interpret another's view by one's own perspective. The 'Strawman Fallacy' only exists where the logic is missing such that where one has bricks to build a strong case, the offender paints the bricks to look like an eyesore about to crumble. Most fallacies are dependent upon such similar preconditions and so require that you give an explanation of HOW I was being illogical about my expressed reasoning that I opted to use an effective analogy to match.

Your above argument is nothing more that saying,

(1) X is DEFINED 'immoral'
(2) Y is DEFINED as "moral"
(3) X is exclusively outside of Y [or X = not-Y]
(4) Things that are "moral" are things that I like. I like Y
(5) Things that are "immoral" are things that I do not like. I dislike X
CONCLUSION: WE all (shall) agree to Y or risk being put up against The Wall!

The argument here is true in how we actually assign value as something we prefer all others to like because it is subjectively 'good' for ourselves. It is either that or maybe you just need a little 'pinprick' of that needle's good medicine to make you feel sane like the ME!? The argument you think is simple is mistaken because you are 'generalizing' from 'instances' where you falsely presume that you are fully qualified to know what X and Y are CORRECTLY.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 9:00 am

Scott Mayers wrote: ↑Sun Mar 01, 2020 8:45 am A 'bottom-up' approach begins with assuming NOTHING at all, both literally and figuratively. It is you who is thinking top-down given you assign something you think is true as a NECESSARY truth before you have scientific or logical proof of whatever you are calling "inherent moral funciton'.

I told you what it is on a chemical/biochemical level. Take some 'train' like chemical that might act as without moral concern as the underlying mechanism of some initial neutral and uncaring being. As it carelessly flies by, it might happen that some other chemical gets hooked and trapped in one of the cars of this train. While the passenger chemical could be 'bad', it might eat through the car and destroy the train. It then doesn't get to its destintation and both the train and the chemical doesn't get passed on to wherever else the train was heading without cause.

The alternative is that the chemical does nothing but sit on that car for its nature may be one that doesn't happen to eat cars. The train on its way to nowhere in particular, gets trapped in some place where other chemicals unload the 'cargo' which includes that free rider. This chemical that got a ride then gets welcomed as a guest for 'surviving' and this place's mayor grants him a name, call him "good".

That is all that begins the chain of abstract unthinking behavior that eventually becomes a whole being, like a human, who assigns value to whatever he gets attention for optimally. The less he cries in his life, the more likely he suffers less and gets to beat all those at the end who dies off assuring his VICTORY to assert he knows how great life is because he was 'good' enough to outlive all others.

This belief you have about intrinsic moral virtue is the same transference of Darwin's Theory of Evolution that references 'fitness' (as in a good match to its environment) into the different meaning, "fitness" (as in those that are healthy and good) [called 'Social Darwinism'] Note that it may be true that most women might prefer the nice and healthy 'fit' male who lifts weights at the gym each day after a long day as C.E.O. to his own business Empire and is in demand. But what tends to happen if the woman does this too? Is she admired for big muscles and her dominance to most men?

This is not to say this is not changing today. Rather, I'm pointing out how one is not 'considered' good EQUALLY among all members in society. To have the mere muscle on the side that wins does not make them 'superior' (nor 'inferior"). The accident of getting lucky enough to be born at all over other prenatal conceptions that die early on, makes the succeding one get to be the one that defines what 'good' it means to "be alive".

I have explained what I meant by my bottom-up and your top-down as imposed politically from above. Again your are introducing a strawman -Darwin, gym, muscled men, women, blah blah blah .. to deviate from my point.

Note my previous post;
The point is, DNA wise ALL humans are "programmed" to survive at all costs until the inevitable and therefrom contribute to the preservation of the species.
Can you dispute this?
Whatever is to be a secular moral objective must be reduced and justified to the above.

You are starting with ASSUMED premises that you expect the logic to prove it true. But Given some X true, then X is true is circularly and, though not faulty by its simple logic, fails to ADD more information, making it "uninteresting" as an appeal. You also cannot treat X itself as conclusively true because the question of its legitimacy is what is at issue. That's what "Begging" means as a 'fallacy'.

Let X be 'moral'. Then something 'moral' exists precisely because you started with it prior to proving. You can't use science here because science argues for 'conservation': for any 'good' thing, there must exist an equal but opposing value 'not good' to complement it.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Feb 23, 2020 6:46 am Moral Laws, i.e. objective moral laws are never to be imposed and enforced on any humans. Objective moral laws are to be used merely as guides to facilitate and improve on human behavior naturally and spontaneously.

Surely using a law/rule is the same thing as imposing that law/rule upon oneself?

What does it mean to use "no murder" as a guide only, if you go around murdering people?
A rule is a rule. Either you are obeying it or you aren't. There is some situational irony in your position, given your handle...

Connor : Now you will receive us.
Murphy : We do not ask for your poor or your hungry.
Connor : We do not want your tired and sick.
Murphy : It is your corrupt we claim.
Connor : It is your evil that will be sought by us.
Murphy : With every breath, we shall hunt them down.
Connor : Each day, we will spill their blood till it rains down from the skies.
Murphy : Do not kill. Do not rape. Do not steal. These are principles which every man of every faith can embrace.
Connor : These are not polite suggestions. These are codes of behavior, and those of you that ignore them will pay the dearest cost.
Murphy : There are varying degrees of evil. We urge you lesser forms of filth not to push the bounds and cross over into true corruption, into our domain.
Connor : For if you do, one day you will look behind you and you will see we three. And on that day, you will reap it.
Murphy : And we will send you to whatever god you wish.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:53 am Re AI, what I meant we cannot expect AI or robots to deal with Morality and Ethics. The only involvement would be the human programmer responsibility to ensure the robots do not kill humans arbitrary.

See, that is a wee-bit of a problem... We have no idea how to explain to a computer what "killing" means, let alone explain the distinction between killing, murder and self-defence.

You are taking the complexity which hides behind the translation of language into behaviour for granted.